Adding free periodicals to your collection can create a collections
development nightmare down the line because typically you end up with a
short, dead runs of the periodical since the free "subscription" ends
after a limited period of time. Use the free copies for selection
purposes or sell them as gifts or put them out in a browsing area but
don't integrate them into your collection. There are, of course,
exceptions, specialty titles that can not be subscribed to via a
periodicals vendor and that you want to have in your collection because
of departmental accreditation or faculty request. This problem happened
here before the advent of an ILS that generates reports on claims and
missing issues. These titles were never bound and lingered in Princeton
files for many, many years until I spent considerable time identifying
them, weeding them (a few were bound and/or subscribed to) and updated
in the ILS. Nevertheless, being alert to your free periodicals and not
being able to claim them and having to watch out for your free run
ending is too much of a hassle IMHO.

Prof. Monica Berger
Technical Services/Electronic Resources Librarian
Ursula C. Schwerin Library
New York City College of Technology, CUNY
300 Jay St.
Brooklyn, NY 11201-1909
718 260-5488
http://library.citytech.cuny.edu
mberger@citytech.cuny.edu